


Sum Total

by Mellorine



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-19
Updated: 2016-01-19
Packaged: 2018-05-14 23:22:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 525
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5762920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mellorine/pseuds/Mellorine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He’s better when he’s with them. Stronger, more in control. The others fill the cracks in him, building him up to something more than he is alone. He knows it deep down in his spark and in every cell of his processor.</p>
<p>It’s all lies.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sum Total

ge·stalt

_noun_

an organized whole that is perceived as more than the sum of its parts.

 

* * *

 

 

He’s better when he’s with them. Stronger, more in control. The others fill the cracks in him, building him up to something more than he is alone. He knows it deep down in his spark and in every cell of his processor.

It’s all lies.

Lies fed to him by the program that would be just as happy to see him the animated husk they’d intended him to be, a head only in body, without intelligence, without power.

Without control.

He remembers everything from that time. Sitting doll-like as Soundwave plotted. Going under the saw for his new frame. Acting just like everyone thought he was as he slowly sowed chaos, planting the seeds for Megatron’s return. He wonders if this was what Kup felt like when he slipped into the old mech’s mind, if he felt as used, as powerless. Not that it matters if he did. He’d do it again in an instant.

But they didn’t control him, in the end. He was stronger than they were. On his own he could never break free from Bombshell’s control, but as _Devastator_ , he was able to finally rip himself free.

Free.

That’s a lie too.

Now he has five shadows dogging his steps, like someone’s cruel parody of a conscience. _“We like how you think, Prowl.”_ He has near-perfect control over them too, or as much as he can without being in their heads (but he has been in their heads, and they in his, and they _liked_ it there), but what good is that? That the only people who understand and agree are five idiot Decepticons?

No, their yes-manning is exactly what he’d want in someone who actually mattered, but in them it’s worse than useless. It undermines him. At best, it makes him a laughingstock among his fellow Autobots. _“Oh good. I was hoping your friends would come out of hiding.”_   At worst it makes everyone distrust him. How much Decepticon remains in him? Five parts out of six, to be exact.

But when they’re combined, when they’re one, he’s ( _they’re_ ) none of these things. Neither Autobot nor Decepticon. Neither Prowl, nor Hook, nor Bonecrusher, nor Mixmaster, nor Long Haul, nor Scavenger, but at the same time all of them, and more. Bigger. Stronger. Smarter. Better. He opens his optics and sees out of six sets in one. It doesn’t matter if they undermine him when they’re apart, because when they’re together they _can’t._ They’re the same person. The leg doesn’t fight the arm. The head doesn’t bicker with its limbs. They all merely _do_ , as is natural with a full body and impossible when the parts are separated.

He’s better with them ( _nothing with them_ ), stronger ( _weaker_ ), more in control ( _powerless_ ). He doesn’t exist when they’re together, and when they’re together the quiddity of _him_ is more than it ever could be alone.

He’s not in control. He could never be in control.

They’re in perfect control.

 

* * *

 

 

ge·stalt

_noun_

an organized whole that is perceived as _other_ than the sum of its parts.

 

 

 


End file.
